My new variety of lily plant originated as a seedling selected from a group of seedlings at Gresham, Oreg. The seedlings were planted as part of a lily breeding program carried on by me since the year 1964. This program had as its main objective the production of upright Asiatic hybrid lilies having a yellow color, being highly resistant to disease and tolerant to virus, having a high bud count and flowers of a pleasing yellow tone, and generally suitable for the cut flower-forcing trade.
I achieved the desired objective by using as the seed parent a second generation (F.sub.2) Lilium hybrid from the cross (`Mega` .times. `Lemon Queen`) .times. `Edith Cecilia`. The pollen parent was Lilium `Croesus`.
My new lily plant has an erect and stately form. It has a strong single stem of medium height. It grows vigorously.
The foliage of my new plant is full and comprises lanceolate leaves dark green in color and 2 to 3 inches long.
The inflorescence of my new lily plant is particularly outstanding, the flower placement and form being almost perfect. The bud count is high and the flower color highly pleasing. The color of the buds when the tepals first divide and begin to unfurl is lemon yellow with a gold center. The color of the mature flowers is a slightly deepened lemon yellow with golden midribs; the center half of each tepal is lightly spotted with medium-sized magenta to brown spots.
My new lily plant is also characterized by the desirable qualities of being highly resistant to disease, tolerant to virus, and subject to propagation by forcing precooled bulbs thereby rendering it well suited for application to the production of potted plants and cut flowers, all as observed at Gresham, Oreg.
My new variety of lily plant has been asexually reproduced by me and under my direction at Gresham, Oreg. Successive generations produced by bulb scale propagation and natural propagation from bulblets have demonstrated that the novel and distinctive characteristics of my new variety are fixed and hold true under asexual propagation from generation to generation.